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The Hauser Report: The Meaning of Crawford-Porter

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On Saturday night, November 20, Terence Crawford successfully defended his WBO 147-pound title with a tenth-round knockout of Shawn Porter before a sold-out crowd of 11,568 at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. It was a statement win for Crawford that boxing fans hope will pave the way for more and bigger career-defining fights in the future.

Crawford came into the bout recognized as one of the top pound-for-pound fighters in the world. His record stood at 37-0 with 28 knockouts. But at age 34, he didn’t have a defining fight on his resume. As Jimmy Tobin wrote after Terence’s fourth-round stoppage of a faded Kell Brook last year, “No one seriously denies Crawford’s talent, but no one seriously denies he is squandering it.” Bart Barry noted, “Just because he has been near the top of abstract rankings for a couple years doesn’t mean his reign has been a good one.”

Crawford moved into the public eye with eleven fights on HBO during a fifty-month span that ended on May 20, 2017. The opponents were learning experiences, some more challenging than others. Terence did what he was supposed to do against them.

Then Crawford’s activity level dropped. Over the next 54 months, he had only six fights. In the first – against Julius Indongo – he unified the four major 140-pound belts with an impressive third-round stoppage. But Indongo has now been knocked out in four of his last five outings.

After beating Indongo, Crawford moved up to 147 pounds and dominated a mix of past-their-prime names (Brook and Amir Khan) and marginal opponents (Jeff Horn, Jose Benavidez, and Egidijus Kavaliauskas). He’d been on the sidelines for more than a year before fighting Porter.

Why hasn’t the superbly talented Crawford become a star?

For starters, the reality of boxing is that very few stars have been made since HBO dropped out of the business. One might ask why ESPN can’t make stars in the sweet science? After all, ESPN has a much larger platform than HBO ever had. And it has money. In addition to advertising revenue and monthly payments from cable system operators, ESPN receives income from more than seventeen million people who subscribe to ESPN+. Within this framework, it pays Top Rank a reported $84 million annually in license fees for fights pursuant to a seven-year contract.

But long-term output deals with a promoter are often counterproductive for a network because they take away the network’s biggest bargaining chip – the date. And they encourage the practice of fighters only fighting opponents who are under the same promotional umbrella (a practice akin to the inbred insanity that once accompanied members of royal families in Europe marrying their own cousins).

One key to HBO’s success was that its boxing program was open to all promoters. That encouraged star-making fights. Indeed, one reason for the decline of HBO’s boxing program was that there came a time when it forged an alliance with Al Haymon and gave Haymon’s fighters preferential treatment in a way that wasn’t in HBO’s best interests and worked against the best fighting the best.

These forces came to a head for Crawford after his November 14, 2020, knockout of Kell

Brook. Bob Arum (Terence’s promoter) was asked by The Athletic about Crawford’s   future with Top Rank and, clearly frustrated, responded, “He’s got to promote like {Teofimo} Lopez does. He’s got to promote like Shakur {Stevenson} does, like Mayweather did, like Pacquiao did. If he doesn’t, then who the f*** needs him? He may be the greatest fighter in the world. But hey, I ain’t going bankrupt promoting him. I could build a house in Beverly Hills on the money I’ve lost on him in the last three fights, a beautiful home. Nobody questions Crawford’s tremendous ability. The question is, ‘Does he pay the bills?'”

Four days later, Crawford responded during a SiriusXM interview. Some of his comments were confrontational. “It pissed me off because I’m one of the most loyal people,” Terence said. “For him to say some foolish sh** like that, it made me look at him a totally different way. Release me now and you don’t have to lose money no more. I’m not a promoter. What am I? A fighter. I get paid to fight, I don’t get paid to promote. He gets paid to promote. He’s supposed to promote me. I always felt like I was set up from the jump so they didn’t have to pay me the money that I deserved. I used to take pay cuts because I didn’t care about the money. Now he’s going to pay me more [than] the [contractual] minimum every single time that I fight because I deserve it. You’re going to pay me what I’m worth.”

But Crawford also struck a conciliatory note, saying, “I can’t bash Bob Arum and Top Rank. They gave me the opportunity to accomplish everything in my career. I know deep down in my heart that Bob really is a good dude and he really did try everything possible in his will to get these fights I was asking for. I don’t know what made him come out and say all of the negative stuff he said about me. I have a lot of things going through my head right now. I don’t really like to talk about it because I’m not the kind of person to put my business in the streets. If I ever had a problem with Bob Arum and Top Rank, I always went to them. We may have a disagreement right now. We’re going through some trials and tribulations, but we’re gonna get it figured out. Top Rank is the company I am with right now, but who knows what the future may hold.”

Money can soothe hurt feelings. Top Rank’s relationship with Teofimo Lopez is Exhibit A for that proposition. But Top Rank built Oscar De La Hoya, Floyd Mayweather, and Miguel Cotto to super-stardom, shepherded Manny Pacquiao through his glory years, and lost all of them. That’s the nature of boxing. So, with time running out on its contract with Crawford, Top Rank matched Terence against Shawn Porter.

Porter had compiled a 31-3-1 (17 KOs) record that included victories over Devon Alexander, Paulie Malignaggi, Adrien Broner, Andre Berto, Danny Garcia, and Yordenis Ugas. But he’d lost his three biggest fights – against Kell Brook, Keith Thurman, and Errol Spence.

On the business side of things, Porter was promoted by Al Haymon (Arum’s archrival in recent years). But Haymon was willing to cede control of Crawford-Porter to Top Rank. And Terence was likely to leave Top Rank once his contractual obligation to the promoter was fulfilled (which it now has been). So, from Arum’s point of view, why not make the fight?

Meanwhile, from Haymon’s point of view, an upset would increase Porter’s marketability. And let’s not forget, Haymon would love to sign Crawford.

The build-up to Crawford-Porter was largely about Crawford. Porter is a class act and a good fighter who has always been willing to go in tough. But in terms of marketability, his ring losses had put a ceiling on how high he could climb.

There was also a question as to what Porter would bring to the ring on fight night. He’d fought only once in the preceding 26 months – an uninspiring win by decision over the justifiably unheralded Sebastian Formella. Indeed, some observers regarded Porter largely as a measuring stick for Crawford. Terence opened as a 4-to-1 betting favorite and the odds moved as high as 6-to-1. Yes, Porter was “always dangerous.” And this was an opportunity for him to reboot. But at age 35, could he compete with Crawford?

Terence thought not. “I respect everything that Shawn does,” Crawford said at the final pre-fight press conference. “Shawn is athletic. He can box. He can bang. He can move around in the ring. He can cut corners and take angles. I’m just going to say that I do a lot of things better than Shawn.”

When fight night came, Porter fought as hoped for, applying pressure as best he could. Crawford was simply better.

Terence is a complete fighter, who shifts seamlessly from orthodox to southpaw. He now has “man strength” to go with his skills.  He’s no longer just a slick boxer; he’s a puncher. With an attitude. And he keeps his strength as a fight wears on.

Porter fought well. The judges’ scorecards were remarkably consistent. Each judge tallied each round the same except for round eight (which Steve Weisfeld and Dave Moretti scored for Porter and Max DeLuca gave to Crawford). After nine rounds, the cards stood at 87-84, 86-85, 86-85 in Terence’s favor. But on a more primal level, Crawford had established his dominance.

The end came in round ten. Fifteen seconds into the stanza, a sharp right uppercut landed flush on Porter’s jaw and dropped him to the canvas. Shawn rose at the count of three. Crawford went after him and connected with a crushing straight left followed by three more head shots of varying severity that downed Porter for the second time. This time, Shawn was up at seven. Referee Celestino Ruiz was assessing the situation when Kenny Porter (Shawn’s trainer and father) stepped onto the ring apron and stopped the fight.

I understand my dad’s position,” Shawn said at the post-fight press conference. “I took too many shots right there, clean. And that’s not what we do. It was bad defense, hands were down. Part of me wanted to get back and was careless. And then the other part of me was a little out of it and not able to defend myself quick enough.”

Shawn then announced his retirement from boxing. Let’s hope he stands by that decision.

As for the future; the fight that most boxing fans want to see next is Crawford vs. Errol Spence. But it appeared as though Spence didn’t want to fight Crawford before. And most likely, he doesn’t want to fight him now.

At the post-fight press conference on Saturday night, Porter (who lost a split decision to Spence in 2019) observed, “Terence is different. It’s like you can’t really pick up everything it is that he does. He does everything more than exceptionally well. Going twelve rounds with Errol Spence was not as tough as fighting Terence Crawford. He’s the best out of everybody I have been in the ring with.”

And Crawford seems to have given up on the idea that Spence will step in the ring with him, saying, “That fight is past me pushing. I did everything that I possibly can do to try to make that fight happen. Everybody kept saying, ‘Oh, I’m chasing him. I’m this and I’m that.’ Yeah, I was chasing him. And he don’t want the fight. He was saying he wanted the fight, but he really didn’t want the fight. And my thing was just, if you wanted the fight, you could’ve made the fight happen. I really don’t see us fighting, to tell you the truth. Sometimes you just let those fights pass you by.”

Spence, of course, is promoted by Al Haymon, who also has other potential high-profile opponents for Crawford under contract. But it remains to be seen whether Haymon’s big-money names will be willing to risk their titles and physical wellbeing against Terence.

As for his promotional future, Crawford declared at the post-fight press conference, “I’m pretty sure my decision is made already. I’m moving forward with my career right now and I wish everybody the best.”

But Top Rank has done an excellent job of building Crawford to this point. And if Terence wants big-money guarantees going forward, he might have to wait for Canelo Alvarez’s promotional situation to play out before getting clarity with regard to his own situation.

Canelo has said that he’s happy with his status as a free agent. After all but disappearing on DAZN for six consecutive fights, he generated an estimated 800,000 pay-per-view buys for his November 6 outing against Caleb Plant. Signing Canelo is a goal for every major network and promoter in boxing. Based on his showing against Plant (in the ring and economically), a network might decide to throw an irresistible amount of money at him (as DAZN did several years ago).

Canelo, because of the opponents he has faced, deserves today’s #1 pound-for-pound ranking. But Crawford is in the conversation. Meanwhile, Terence has some thoughts that merit consideration in closing:

*         “A lot of people are born with the urge to win everything. That’s me. Some people are born with more heart. You can’t teach heart. You can’t teach somebody to take punches. Some people are just born with natural ability and God-gifted skills. I believe that I’m one of them.”

*         “Me as a fighter, a lot of people on the outside can see something different. ‘Oh, I see this and I see that. I can exploit this kind of defense and do this with Terence Crawford.’ Then, when they get in the ring with me, I’m totally different. Seeing something and being in the ring is two totally different things.”

*         “I look at most of the critics, you know, they don’t even know too much about boxing. They just go on what the next person saying or what they read and what they hear. They not going on they own boxing knowledge. So, I don’t really too much bother to care what critics say or how they view me and how they rate me.”

Thomas Hauser’s email address is thomashauserwriter@gmail.com. His most recent book – Broken Dreams: Another Year Inside Boxing – was published by the University of Arkansas Press. In 2004, the Boxing Writers Association of America honored Hauser with the Nat Fleischer Award for career excellence in boxing journalism. In 2019, he was selected for boxing’s highest honor – induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

Photo credit: Mikey Williams / Top Rank via Getty images

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Thomas Hauser is the author of 52 books. In 2005, he was honored by the Boxing Writers Association of America, which bestowed the Nat Fleischer Award for career excellence in boxing journalism upon him. He was the first Internet writer ever to receive that award. In 2019, Hauser was chosen for boxing's highest honor: induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame. Lennox Lewis has observed, “A hundred years from now, if people want to learn about boxing in this era, they’ll read Thomas Hauser.”

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The Hauser Report: What’s Going On With Premier Boxing Champions?

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Eight years ago, Al Haymon unveiled what many thought would be the future of boxing. The boxing community had been awash in rumors for months. Haymon was amassing a war chest totaling hundreds of millions of dollars with the help of a venture capital fund in an effort to take over the sport . . . Haymon was signing hundreds of fighters to managerial and advisory contracts . . . Haymon was planning some sort of TV series . . . Time-buys on multiple networks for an entity called Premier Boxing Champions (PBC) were confirmed.

On March 7, 2015, Haymon began the rollout of his plan when NBC televised the inaugural PBC offering – a fight card featuring Keith Thurman and Adrien Broner in separate bouts. Free boxing. On network television.

But the plan fell short of expectations. Advertisers didn’t come onboard. DAZN and then Saudi Arabia became the flavor of the month. Now PBC is seeking to reassert itself through an alliance with Amazon. The first “PBC on Prime Video” offering will be a pay-per-view event on March 30 from the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. But PBC isn’t the power it once was. No one talks about Al Haymon taking over boxing anymore.

Amazon will distribute the PBC show. It wants to build a live pay-per-view platform for multiple events, and this is an early foray into that realm. It has no interest in playing the sort of role that HBO and Showtime played in boxing. Amazon (like In Demand) will take and distribute the product it’s given.

The PBC pay-per-view events that are streamed on Prime Video will also be available to viewers through other streaming platforms like PPV.com as well as linear-TV cable and satellite PPV distributors.

In addition, Prime Video has said that it will stream a series of “free” (with a subscription to Amazon Prime) PBC Championship Boxing events in the United States and other designated countries on an exclusive basis.

The degree to which Amazon will provide a marketing push for PBC’s shows is unclear at the present time.

Four fights will be on the March 30 PPV stream. The main event was to have matched Keith Thurman vs. Tim Tszyu. Eight years ago when he headlined PBC’s inaugural telecast on NBC, Thurman was young and fresh. Now he’s 35 years old and has won only one fight in the preceding five years (a ten-round decision over Mario Barrios). Tszyu (the son of Kostya Tszyu) was eased into the WBO 154-pound title through an “interim” portal and is being groomed for a big-money fight down the road.

Then, earlier today (March 18), it was reported that Thurman had been injured in training camp and Sebastian Fundora (who’d been slated to fight Serheii Bohachuk on the undercard) will likely face Tszyu. Fundora was speeding along a fast track until his most recent fight which saw him pitching a shutout against Brian Mendoza when a one-punch knockout in round seven derailed his dream.

Sebastian Fundora

Sebastian Fundora

The primary supporting bouts on the pay-per-view stream are expected to be Erislandy Lara vs. Michael Zerafa and Rolly Romero vs. Isaac Cruz.

Lara is forty years old. During the past five years, he has fought Ramon Alvarez, Greg Vendetti, Thomas LaManna, and Gary O’Sullivan (which somehow enabled him to claim the WBA 160-pound belt). Zerafa’s primary qualification seems to be that (like Tszyu) he’s from Australia.

Romero is a tiresome loudmouth who often fails to back up his talk. He was knocked out by Gervonta Davis and was trailing Ismael Barroso on all three judges’ scorecards when a premature stoppage by referee Tony Weeks gifted him the WBA 140-pound belt. Cruz went the distance in a losing effort against Davis.

Former Showtime Sports president Stephen Espinoza has been consulted with regard to production on the March 30 PPV stream. As of this writing, the commentating team hasn’t been announced (which is odd since the event is less than two weeks away).

Meanwhile, the rest of the sports landscape is rapidly changing.

On January 23, it was announced that Netflix (Prime Video’s most formidable competitor with 247 million subscribers) had signed a deal to stream WWE’s flagship wrestling show – Raw. The ten-year deal will cost Netflix roughly five billion dollars. Netflix can opt out of the deal after five years or, if it chooses, extend it for another ten years.

Then, on March 7, Netflix furthered its commitment to “trash sports” when it announced that Mike Tyson and Jake Paul will meet in the ring in Texas on July 20 in an encounter to be streamed live on Netflix. It’s unclear whether the encounter will be a “fight” or a glorified sparring session.

Adding to the mix; Disney, Fox, and Warner Brothers announced on February 6 that they will launch a joint subscription streaming service later this year that will bundle sports content from ESPN and affiliated networks (such as ABC, ESPN2, ESPNU, SECN, ACCN, ESPNEWS), the Warner Brothers’ Discovery networks that showcase sports (TNT, TBS, TruTV), and Fox (the Fox broadcast network in addition to FS1, FS2 and BTN).

But back to PBC on Prime Video. If the March 30 fight card were streamed as part of the Amazon Prime membership package, it would be a plus for boxing fans. But it won’t be. It’s a pay-per-view event. And even before Thurman’s injury, it wasn’t pay-per-view-worthy as that term was once understood.

You get only one chance to make a first impression. This isn’t a good first impression for PBC on Prime Video.

***

On December 17, I posted a column in which I urged that Gerry Cooney and Cedric Kushner be included on the ballot for induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame. There’s another, more obvious omission that I’d like to address.

Al Haymon has been at the center of the boxing universe for two decades. He built his power through a series of alliances with HBO (his point person was Kery Davis), Golden Boy (Richard Schaefer), and investors (Waddell & Reed) and maintained it through dealings with Showtime (Stephen Espinoza) and various other networks. There were times when it seemed as though he was on the verge of “taking over boxing.” Now Saudi Arabian oil money is the dominant force. But Haymon is breaking new ground through an association between Premier Boxing Champions and Amazon Video.

Haymon likes to style himself as an “advisor” or “manager.” In reality, he functions as a promoter. But labels are irrelevant. The bottom line is that no one has had a greater influence on boxing over the past twenty years than Al Haymon. He belongs in the International Boxing Hall of Fame, and the first step toward that end is to put his name on the ballot for induction.

Thomas Hauser’s email address is thomashauserwriter@gmail.com. His next book — “MY MOTHER and me” — is a personal memoir that will be published by Admission Press this spring and is available for pre-order at Amazon.com. https://www.amazon.com/My-Mother-Me-Thomas-Hauser/dp/1955836191/ref=sr_1_1?crid=5C0TEN4M9ZAH&keywords=thomas+hauser&qid=1707662513&sprefix=thomas+hauser%2Caps%2C80&sr=8-1

In 2004, the Boxing Writers Association of America honored Hauser with the Nat Fleischer Award for career excellence in boxing journalism. In 2019, Hauser was selected for boxing’s highest honor – induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

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Dillian Whyte Returns from Purgatory and Brushes Away a Wimpy Opponent in Ireland

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Dillian Whyte Returns from Purgatory and Brushes Away a Wimpy Opponent in Ireland

Tomorrow (Monday) is a national holiday in Ireland which is always the case whenever Saint Patrick’s Day happens to fall on a Sunday. That explains why today’s fight card in the County Mayo town of Castlebar is being staged on a Sunday. After the show, the attendees with regular jobs can stay up late quaffing down a few pints at their favorite pub knowing they can sleep-in tomorrow. (And they likely needed a few pints to wash away the pain of paying good money to see this craphole show.)

All of the A-Side fighters were Irishmen including the headliner Dillian Whyte, a Londoner of Jamaican extraction who claims that one of his grandparents was born in Ireland. The “Body Snatcher” was matched against German-Romanian slug Christian Hammer.

Whyte, who turns 36 next month, last fought in November of 2022 when he won a lackluster decision over Jermaine Franklin. His rematch with Anthony Joshua in August of last year fell out when an “adverse analytical finding” turned up in his VADA test. Whyte bellowed loudly that he was innocent, but there was the presumption of guilt because he had served a two-year ban for illegal substances earlier in his career. But lo and behold, in a curious development, Whyte was cleared this month when a forensics expert associated with the Texas Boxing Commission asserted that the adverse result was caused by a nutritional supplement that contained a contaminent that wasn’t disclosed on the supplement’s list of ingredients. (Whyte was training in the United States and licensed to fight in Texas when the random drug test was administered.)

Hammer brought a 27-10 (17) record but had been stopped five times, most recently by Joe Joyce who blew him away in four rounds. He was in Castlebar just for the payday and retired on his stool after three frames. He was never down in the fight, but was tattooed with a bunch of punches on his flabby midsection. (The weights were not announced.)

With the win, Dillian Whyte advanced his record to 30-3 (20 KOs). More relevantly, he is back in the mix in the heavyweight picture. His American trainer Buddy McGirt hopes to have him back in the ring in a couple of months.

Other Bouts of Note

Roy Moylette, a 33-year-old junior welterweight from the nearby town of Islandeady, made the locals happy when he got off the deck to win the decision in an 8-round bout with Argentine journeyman Requen Facundo (17-15-2). Moylette (14-2-1) entered the pro ranks with a wealth of international amateur experience, but his pro career never took off. Heading into this match, he announced it would be his farewell fight.

The Argentine, a late sub who had begun his pro career as a featherweight, had Moylette on the canvas in the second round but couldn’t sustain the momentum. The referee, who had the unusual but unmistakably Irish name of Padraig O’Reachtagain, scored it 76-75.

In what was likely his final pro fight, 39-year-old Cork super middleweight Gary “Spike” O’Sullivan left on a downbeat note, losing an 8-round decision to Sofiane Khati. O’Reachtagain had it 77-76 for the outsider.

O’Sullivan (31-6, 21 KOs) will be remembered as the Irishman who wore a handlebar mustache during his fighting days in Boston, a look that harked to John L. Sullivan who Spike believed to be a distant relative. In his previous bout in May of 2022 he was stopped in eight frames by Erislandy Lara in Brooklyn, his fourth setback inside the distance and third in his last six.

A 31-year-old French-Algerian, Khati improved to 15-4 (5).

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Boxing Notes and Nuggets from Thomas Hauser: ‘The Blue Corner’

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Boxing, like all sports, is more fun to watch when the viewer has a rooting interest. That interest can spring from a variety of factors. Some people like or dislike a particular fighter on a personal level. Others – let’s be honest – root for or against a fighter based on ethnicity.

If I don’t know either of the fighters in a fight, I root for the underdog.

That can be dispiriting. Too many fight cards today consist largely of A-side vs. B-side fights. As a general rule, the A-side fighter comes out of the red corner and the B-side fighter is seated in the blue corner. Upsets are few and far between.

Tom Loeffler’s March 15 fight card at Madison Square Garden’s Hulu Theater is a case in point. There are underdogs and then there are hopeless underdogs. I went to the fights hoping something that wasn’t supposed to happen would happen. But a look at the opponents’ records told me that was unlikely.

BoxRec.com is a wonderful tool for scoping out how competitive a fight is likely to be. Here’s what I learned from BoxRec.com before the fights and how things unfolded in the ring.

Fight #1: Giovanni Scuderi (9-0, 4 KOs) vs. Brandon Carmack – Scuderi’s last opponent had 57 losses. And that opponent might have beaten Carmack. I’m sure Brandon could decimate most people in a bar fight. But he lumbered around the ring like a heavybag with feet. Scuderi telegraphs every righthand he throws. But he has a basic jab. The match had the appearance of a picador sticking lances into a slow sluggish bull. W4 for Scuderi.

Fight #2: Nisa Rodriguez (0-0) vs. Jozette Cotton – Rodriguez is a 33-year-old New York City police officer with an extensive amateur background who was making her pro debut. Cotton was winless in four pro fights. Rodriguez fought tentatively. Cotton had a roll of flab around her waist (which spoke to her conditioning) and fought like she didn’t know how to box. W4 for Rodriguez.

Fight #3 Joseph Ward (10-1, 6 KOs) vs. Derrick Webster – Webster is 41 years old and has now won one of six fights since 2018. KO 2 for Ward.

Fight #4: Reshat Mati (14-0, 8 KOs) vs. Irving Macias – Macias has lost three of his last four fights, and the guy he beat during that stretch has 19 losses (including his last seven fights in a row). W8 for Mati.

Fight #5: Cletus Seldin (27-1, 23 KOs) vs. Jose Angulo – Angulo has lost six of his last eight fights, including four KOs by. W8 for Seldin, Here, I should note that, after the fight, Seldin took the ring announcer’s microphone, dropped to one knee, opened a small box containing a diamond engagement ring, and asked one Jessica Ostrowski to marry him. The future Mrs. Seldin (who was clad in black leather) said yes, and the happy couple paraded around the ring together.

Fight #6: Feargal McCrory (15-0, 7 KOs) vs. Carlos Carlson –  Carlson has had ten fights since 2016 and lost seven of them. The three guys he beat during that stretch have 92 losses between them. And he hadn’t fought in more than two years. Referee David Fields did the fans a favor by stopping the bout prematurely in round three. If Carlson had fought as vigorously during the fight as he complained about the stoppage afterward, it would have been a better fight.

Fight #7: The main event matched Callum Walsh (9-0, 7 KOs) against Dauren Yeleussinov. Walsh is a 23-year-old junior-middleweight who UFC CEO Dana White is trying to build as a boxing version of Conor McGregor. Yeleussinov has lost three of his last four fights (including a first-round KO by). And the opponent Dauren beat during that stretch has 22 losses (including a current losing streak of 19 a row). Yeleussinov was tailor-made for Walsh – slow on his feet with slow hands and not much of a punch. Callum got off first all night. KO 9.

In six of the seven fights, the underdog lost every round.

I’m tired of fighters who talk tough and posture at press conferences but won’t fight an opponent who’s remotely competitive. And yes; I know that prospects can’t go in tough every time out. But a prospect’s opponent should pose some kind of challenge.

And let’s be honest; most of the fighters on the March 15 card were there because they were local ticket-sellers, not prospects. Only Walsh has world-class potential. He’s 23 years old with skills and is getting better. Right now, he’s a very good club fighter. Let’s see if he becomes something more.

*        *        *

One moment from promoter Larry Goldberg’s March 7 club-fight card at Sony Hall in New York stands out in my mind.

In the second fight of the evening, Jason Castanon and Luis Rivera-Reyes squared off against one another in a scheduled four-round junior-welterweight bout. Each man was making his pro debut. Castanon’s opponent had pulled out the previous week, leaving matchmaker Eric Bottjer scrambling for a new opponent. Rivera-Reyes had been scheduled to fight on the undercard of a show in Puerto Rico but his opponent had also fallen out, so he was available.

Bottjer thought that Castanon vs. Rivera-Reyes would be a competitive fight. Each man was old for a boxer making his pro debut. Castano is 30; Rivera-Reyes is 35. But they had comparable amateur backgrounds.

Rivera-Reyes held his own in round one. But Castanon was the stronger, better-schooled fighter. In round two, Luis started getting beaten up. The punishment mounted in round three. Rivera-Reyes was still trying to win but it was a futile effort. With seconds left in the third stanza, a righthand staggered Luis and a second righthand put him down hard. He rose through an incredible act of will because that’s what real fighters do. But he was badly hurt and on wobbly legs. Referee Eddie Claudio asked if he wanted to continue.

Rivera-Reyes shook his head. No.

Afterward, an uncharitable observer said that Luis “quit.”

I think that Luis acted with honor. Sitting several feet from the ring, I had a perfect view of the pain and despair etched on his face as he confronted the reality that he was a beaten man. He didn’t jump to his feet at the count of ten-and-a-half, pretending that he was ready to keep fighting. He didn’t ignore the referee’s question and feign outrage when the fight was stopped. He acknowledged that he had given his all and was beaten. Fighters aren’t video-game figures. They get hurt. And sometimes they just can’t take anymore.

The moment reminded me of the 1983 rematch between Alexis Arguello and Aaron Pryor. Pryor had won their classic first encounter with a brutal knockout that left Arguello unconscious on the ring canvas. In round ten of Pryor-Arguello II, Alexis found himself on the canvas again. He was a warrior, one of the greatest fighters of all time. He could have gotten up. But he didn’t. He had done the best he could and realized that it was over. He sat with tears streaming down his face and later acknowledged. “It’s hard to accept, but it’s good to accept. I did it with grace and just accepted that the guy beat me. Even though I did my best, in the tenth round I accepted it right there. I said, ‘This is too much. I won’t take it. I‘ll just sit and watch Richard Steele count to ten.'”The look in Luis Rivera-Reyes’s eyes when he shook his head will stay with me for a long time. He had been beaten into submission in his first pro fight. And I wondered, how long will he hold onto the dream.

*          *          *

A nod to “March Madness” which begins this week . . .

College basketball has a problem – court storming.

It’s now in vogue for fans of the home team to surge onto the court after a big win. Tearing down the goal posts in football endangers fans who are tearing down the goal posts. Court storming endangers the players.

On January 21, Caitlin Clark (Iowa’s superstar guard) was knocked to the floor when Ohio State fans stormed the court after a big win.

On February 24, Kyle Fitzpatrick (Duke’s All-American center) injured his knee when Wake Forest fans stormed the court after a dramatic upset.

To date, the NCAA has done nothing about the problem. Several conferences have taken action on their own, the most notable example being the SEC which instituted an escalating fine that begins at $100,000 for the first incident. By contrast, the ACC has no penalty for court-storming; the Big Ten has no penalty until the third incident; and the Big East penalizes offending schools the paltry sum of $5,000.

It shouldn’t be hard to end court storming.

The NCAA should institute a rule – and fans should be advised late in each contest – that court storming will result in forfeiture of the game.

***

Thomas Hauser’s email address is thomashauserwriter@gmail.com. His next book – MY MOTHER and me – is a personal memoir that will be published by Admission Press on April 2 and is available for pre-order at Amazon.com.https://www.amazon.com/My-Mother-Me-Thomas-Hauser/dp/1955836191/ref=sr_1_1?crid=5C0TEN4M9ZAH&keywords=thomas+hauser&qid=1707662513&sprefix=thomas+hauser%2Caps%2C80&sr=8-1

          In 2004, the Boxing Writers Association of America honored Hauser with the Nat Fleischer Award for career excellence in boxing journalism. In 2019, Hauser was selected for boxing’s highest honor – induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

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